Bias and Reasoning: Haidt's theory of moral judgment

Summary:

Opinions about moral and political issues are like iPhones and Facebook profiles, everybody has one, but not everyone makes sure they're up to date.  Oftentimes, people try to preserve their favored opinion by rationalizing away any new evidence.  Indeed, according to Jonathan Haidt's Social Intuitionist Model (SIM) the majority of our moral judgments are arrived at by means of non-conscious automatic intuitive processing and are later justified by post hoc biased reasoning.

In support of this model, Haidt draws on a large body of research that details distortions in human cognition.  For example, it's been found that when expecting to discuss an issue with a partner (especially a friend) whose attitudes are known, people tend to shift their attitudes to align with those of their partner.  When their partner's attitudes are not known, people tend to moderate their opinions to minimize disagreement.  This type of attitude revision is due to what's called the "relatedness motive."  When people want to get along with others, they selectively shift their opinions.

Additionally, another kind of motive that is said to distort our moral judgments is the "coherence motive."  People with this kind of motive want to preserve their identity, and consequently, they eschew evidence that contradicts their core attitudes and beliefs, and they uncritically accept evidence that confirms them.  In one study, for instance, people were given mixed evidence about the efficacy of capital punishment in deterring crime.  Those who went in to the study supporting capital punishment left with greater confidence.  Those who went in to the study against capital punishment also left with greater confidence.  This flies in the face of rational deliberation.  When given evidence inconsistent with one's beliefs, one should lower the confidence of those beliefs.  Hence, the coherence motive may lead to accuracy distortions of our beliefs.

S. Matthew Liao, however, disagrees with Haidt's account of our moral judgments.  He doesn't dispute the fact that we are influenced by our friends or that we seek to preserve our core beliefs and attitudes.  Instead, he disputes that these should properly be considered biases.  For a person to be biased, is to say that they are not epistemically justified in believing certain propositions.  A person may be epistemically unjustified if they lack sufficient evidence to believe in a proposition, or alternatively, if their belief is not grounded in that evidence.

Liao argues that people are typically justified in shifting their beliefs to become consistent with those of their friends.  To see why, consider what it means to be a friend.  A friend is someone whose judgment you typically trust.   When they express a belief, you have reason to believe that their belief is not arbitrarily arrived at.  Further, suppose you and your friend are about equal in intelligence.  It would be positively irrational not to take your friend's opinion into account, and it would be arrogant to suppose that you could not be mistaken.  This reasoning applies about equally as well with strangers.  Suppose you disagree with a person who you have no reason to believe is exceptionally irrational.  Again, given that there's a chance the stranger is correct and you are incorrect, you ought rationally be inclined towards shifting your own confidence, even if just a little bit.  Thus, having the relatedness motive need not entail that a person is biased.

What about the coherence motive?  Liao argues that the coherence motive need not always lead to biased reasoning.  Let's make up a hypothetical example.  Suppose you believe that gun control will lead to fewer violent deaths, and someone else believes the opposite.  Now both of you are given the following two mixed pieces of evidence.

(1) In one state with strict gun control, there is a greater than average number of gang wars, which has lead to more violent deaths.

(2) In one state with lenient gun control, there have been more school shootings.

Here's how you and the other person can both rationally walk away with greater confidence in your initial beliefs.  Suppose you believe, independently of the debate about gun control's relation to violent deaths, that the presence of school shootings decreases the outbreak of future gang wars (somehow).  Suppose the other person believes - again independently of the debate in question - that gang wars lead to fewer school shootings.  You would accept proposition (1) as confirming your beliefs while discounting proposition (2), while the other person would do the opposite.  Thus, you would both rationally leave with greater confidence in your beliefs.

Critique:

Liao's defense of the relatedness motive seems weak.  It's certainly irrational to believe in one's own infallibility.  And it's also irrational to completely discount an epistemic peer's opinion.  But it's also irrational to continue to have one's beliefs shifted after having learned of the reasons behind the disagreement.  Once you know that your friend has a belief because of x, y, and z, the fact that he is your friend becomes irrelevant.  Believing simply because your friend says so is irrational.  Yet it is this kind of shifting of beliefs that (I think) is more common.  It is not that people shift their beliefs because of their epistemic humility, but rather to maintain social relations.  And that is irrational.

Liao's defense of the coherence motive also seems weak.  He concedes that people may be biased towards favoring their initial beliefs.  His argument is simply that belief polarization need not entail that people are biased.  It's an empirical point as to whether or not polarization is, in fact, a result of bias, one which he claims Haidt does not substantiate.  Though all this is true, it obscures where the burden of proof lies.  It is on Liao to show why people systematically gain confidence in their beliefs given mixed evidence.  One would think that if people were assessing the evidence independently of their other beliefs, the statistical variation would be normally distributed.  Instead, people invariably become more confident in their beliefs.  It's Liao that has to explain how this is the case, not the other way around.

The general structure of Liao's arguments is like a wedge.  He tries to show how it's technically possible to account for these results while preserving the rationality of moral judgments.  From this, he suggestively hints that people's moral judgments are in fact rational.  This latter claim, however, is exceptionally lacking in support, and he would do well to acknowledge this more in his paper.

---

Chen, S., Shechter, D., & Chaiken, S. (1996). Getting at the truth or getting along: Accuracy-versus impression-motivated heuristic and systematic processing. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 71(2), 262.

Liao, S. M. (2011). Bias and reasoning: Haidt’s theory of moral judgment. New waves in ethics, 108-128.

Lord, C. G., Ross, L., & Lepper, M. R. (1979). Biased assimilation and attitude polarization: the effects of prior theories on subsequently considered evidence.Journal of personality and social psychology, 37(11), 2098.